Home Sweet Home
By: Russ Rupe

I am the King of the Castle. I must be. I have a moat, or rather, had a moat. All day Labor Day, there was a stream flowing in front of my cookie cutter, suburban housing edition abode. The moat was only an inch deep, so it didn't provide much by way of protection from invaders or dragons or anything else. But, I'm pretty sure that all of the invaders, dragons, and anything elses have moved to the coast in search of smog, caffeine, fresh fish (I hate fresh fish) and good ethnic diners. Nevertheless, as of this writing, I no longer have a moat. Perhaps I've been deposed of my throne. Let me tell you how it all happened.

Bark! Rumble! Crash! At 2:30 AM this morning (i.e. the morning after Labor Day), I awoke to the sound of heavy equipment and a crashing sound in the street mingled with the barking of every dog in the neighborhood including my own in the living room. Bark! My wife got up to investigate. Rumble! "There's a backhoe digging up our mailbox." Crash!

"Really? I just painted the mailbox." Unbelieving, I went to the window to confirm the story. Rumble! To my elation, if that state is possible at 2:31 AM, the mailbox was intact. Beep! Beep! Beep! The backhoe was really just backing off a trailer next to a dump truck so that it could get a better angle of assault. Crash! The backhoe furiously attacked a bit of asphalt 10 feet north of my driveway. Bark! "They must be here to fix the leak in the road. Those (Crash!) jerks! Water ran all day yesterday, but now they think it's some kind of freaking emergency at 2:32 in the morning!" I lay back down, seething. Rumble! The local teamsters union must have prevented the city from calling them out on the holiday when it would have disturbed no one and not cost the workers a night of sleep. Crash! (I looked, but found neither a team of horses nor a bunch of guys wearing jerseys.) Bark! But now that it was no longer a holiday, there seemed to be no union injunction against waking up an entire neighborhood and paying construction workers who-knows-how-much to fix a leaky, buried pipe at 2:33 AM.

I reflected back to my (Bark!) college days when the Mexican lawn care specialists at ORU would be under my window at 7:00 AM (essentially the same time to a college student as 2:34 AM is to a standard homo sapien). Whirrrrr! Clunk! Whirrr--rrr! I never saw the need to eat weeds first thing in the morning. (This is why no one ever saw me in the cafeteria for breakfast.) Rumble! Bark! Rumble! Crash!

This senseless audio violence at 2:35 AM really chapped my butt (Rumble!), so it's a good thing that I kept my Butt-sized Chapstick with optional wall mount from my old high school days. I guess school is back in session now since it's Labor Day. Bark! I hadn't thought of school for a while since I no longer attend or am employed by one. But this amusing anecdote reminded me of the old school paper, and sort of helped me to bring things crashing back into Focus. I could really use some sleep.

Russ Rupe resides in Ohio ("The State of Purpetual Bliss") with his wife Dr. Heather Rupe, son Ryan, and two pint-sized dogs, Chewy and Meg. When not flawlessly performing his duties as Editor-At-Large for Nathan Hood Imageworks, he keeps busy as a game developer for Conquest Gaming. You may contact him through the Conquest Gaming web site at www.ConquestGaming.com

© Copyright Russ Rupe 2002-2003